“The gift of a good liar is making people believe you lack a talent for lying.” President Frank Underwood, House of Cards

This is a series worth watching. Season 4 has just been released.

The language of politics is the language of lying, and it’s hard to recall any other piece of modern fiction about politics that reveals this fact so forcefully and nakedly.

President Frank Underwood; his wife Claire; Will Conway, his opponent in the upcoming election; numerous other characters moving in and out of that orbit—they lie, and they lie all the time, and they especially lie when they profess humanitarian motives, when they express sympathy and caring, when they proclaim hope for a better future. The Good, in fact, is their front-and-center cover story. Whenever The Good is the subject (and when isn’t it?), they pretend to care, but they only and always pretend—because accumulating power is their only desire—and you see the double-faced charade on the screen again and again, until you accept the lying language as business as usual. As the way things are done.

The House of Cards writers are relentless about exposing how political language is used. They don’t back off. They don’t leave any loopholes.

President Frank Underwood is the chief faker.

At the end of season 4, he and his wife, Claire, have made up their minds that their potential exposure (past crimes) is too great to finesse: they must go on an all-out attack. As a grand diversion.

They will “make terror.” They will evoke terrorist high-panic in the American public, and then wage war against the terrorists. They’ll play both sides against the middle.

At last, they know what they must do, and they’re at peace with it. It’s the final answer. Up until now, they’ve only gone part of the way. That didn’t give them protection. So they’ll finish the job.

Their logic is predictable, given what politics is really all about. The only issue is: how far will they go? They have come to the conclusion: there is no limit.

The public, of course, cannot accept such an idea. The public is always fooled on that score. The public always wants to believe The Good is emanating from their own leaders. That is the public’s version of logic, and it too is predictable within a naive bubble of ultimate faith and hope.

House of Cards doesn’t bother exposing how the press aids and abets this faith. It focuses on the main players within the political establishment. In doing so, it teaches a lesson: those players can enlist sympathy, even as they commit one crime after another. Those key players have charm. They have intelligence. They have magnetic force. They are projections of “how to play the game.” They are determined not to lose. They refuse to accept the nets closing in around them. They don’t back down. They never give in to the urge to surrender. They never believe their own lies—they are, thus, much smarter than the public.

At the same time, the viewer sees how transparent these players are. They fall far short of being geniuses. In a half-sane world, they would have been banished to a desert island long ago. But this is not a half-sane world. The People want Hope. They’ll do anything to believe it’s available, from an external source.

Well, this is the external source: Frank and Claire Underwood. A rolled-up duo of implacable hatred. As Claire finally says: “I’m done appealing to the hearts of people; that doesn’t work; now I have to bring out the fear; build it; stoke it.” She isn’t whistling Dixie. In her position as the First Lady and Frank’s vice-presidential running mate, she can do something about it, and she intends to. The two of them will do it together.

House of Cards has nothing to do with gender politics in the usual sense. Claire’s star is rising. She is taking over the reins from her husband. Her coldness has come to equal, and even surpass, his. He, in decline, needs her to stay alive, to function. She is equal to the task.

The silent invisible character in House of Cards is the public, the population, with its unquenchable desire to believe, to hope, to wish—and to fall for the con.

In recent years, we’ve seen several Presidential candidates who haven’t followed the usual script. They haven’t played up the “rescue from above” tune. Ron Paul, Rand Paul, and Trump. Regardless of what you think of them, they’ve broken the mold.

They’ve begun to make the House of Cards paradigm of politics a bit shaky.

But back to RESCUE FROM ABOVE…

Chicago: are jobs and money better than poverty and protests?

As protestors shut down the Trump rally in Chicago, the divide and conquer op in America reaches a new level.

It’s come to the point where many people don’t even want a fix, don’t even want a reversal. They only want to protest. They only want a change from despair to anger.

They want to be a permanent underclass dependent on the government (rescue from above), and at best they seek a new President who will make that dependence more comfortable—as if that were possible.

They no longer see jobs tied to money as a solution. It’s not acceptable to them.

If that is an organizing principle, if that brings people together, then you have…what? You have violence. You have destruction. You have a growing revolution with no aim to change things for the better. In that atmosphere, the only government capable of surviving is a government which promises more Something for Nothing.

And Something for Nothing always has conditions. They add up to greater top-down control, “on behalf of the people.”

“We will give you more. In return, do what we tell you to do. We care. We know what’s best. We work for you. We feel your pain.”

That’s the current sales pitch, of course, but it will rise to new heights.

The one candidate who exemplifies it is Bernie Sanders, who, in his lifetime in Congress, has accomplished virtually nothing.

The subliminal message coming out of Bernie is: “All business is bad. All capitalism is bad. All free enterprise is bad and unfair. Adults are unfair to children. The problem can be solved by government.” Rescue from above.

How that works is a mystery, because it doesn’t work. It never has.

The stark reality is: government doesn’t create jobs over the long-term. Unless you want the USSR. Then everyone has a job. A bad one. Bad job, bad pay, mediocre mindset. No one may rise higher than his neighbor. To do so would be offensive.

In a country like America, you could sell that program as a worker’s utopia for about six months. Until the naïve realized it was very much like living in a slave camp with a cell phone and Facebook.

If I were Bernie Sanders, this is what I would say: “Here is my plan. Here is my rescue from above. Every person in American over the age of 17 who doesn’t make $35,000 a year will get a government check to make sure they do make $35,000 a year. Anyone who makes more than $50,000 a year is a thief and a crook and a capitalist. So whatever they make in excess of 50K will be taken away from them. In addition, every child in America can attend college, regardless of grades or background, for six years. No charge. Every child will get a college diploma, even if they don’t attend classes. For every protest you attend while at college, you’ll receive half an ounce of prime weed. If you hold a Kill Capitalism or I Don’t Need no Stinkin’ Job sign at eight rallies, you’ll receive a virtual reality headset.”

On the basis of that statement, I would expect Bernie rallies to draw upwards of 100,000 people.

Forget socialism. We’re past that. Nobody works. Bring on full-bore automation in every company in America.

Schools have one and only one goal: remove personal ambition from every mind.

“Yeah, I remember it like yesterday, even though it was so long ago, my child. That night in Chicago was the beginning of the real revolution. We started to realize what we really wanted. Nothing. Everything. Know what I mean? We were crazy then. We had to be. That night is why you have this great 150-foot square apartment in an affluent section of town, and the virtual reality and the free drugs and the sleep machine and the protest schools and the no-classes and no teachers…”

“That night is why you have the 250 vaccines in you and the hospital complex that takes up half the Southwest, where you go every year to get your updated psychiatric diagnosis and the gold badge you proudly wear that tells everybody what condition you have, so you all have something to talk about…”

All is well.

Rescue from above is the grand pretense and the grand op.

It can be packaged and sold in so many ways.

After 30 years of working as a reporter and digging into scandals which were falsely sold on the “rescue” basis, I gave a talk at a conference in California, and I presented my alternative. I said:

“I’m selling you to you.”

That’s my pitch.

I’m selling what you are, underneath it all, and what you can be, and these are things only you know. I can point to them.

But I can’t and won’t try to pile up what you should think and what you should decide and what you should do.

You have two great capacities: the ability to reason and analyze; and the infinite ability to imagine.

Imagination takes you into your own future and opens it up without limit. Then you can decide how you want to invent it.

Imagination is everything that doesn’t already exist.

Imagination demolishes all versions of waiting around for rescue from above. Imagination is the fire. The great adventure.

Imagination is you inventing what was previously unknown.

Imagination is independence.

Every person has imagination and, therefore, the potential for independence.

If “politics” has anywhere to go, that’s where.

That’s where the lying and the manipulation and the crimes can stop.

With the individual.

When the illusion of rescue is replaced by imagination and creative fire, then all things are possible…

Jon Rappoport

The author of three explosive collections, THE MATRIX REVEALED, EXIT FROM THE MATRIX, and POWER OUTSIDE THE MATRIX, Jon was a candidate for a US Congressional seat in the 29th District of California. He maintains a consulting practice for private clients, the purpose of which is the expansion of personal creative power. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he has worked as an investigative reporter for 30 years, writing articles on politics, medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine, Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. Jon has delivered lectures and seminars on global politics, health, logic, and creative power to audiences around the world. You can sign up for his free NoMoreFakeNews emails here or his free OutsideTheRealityMachine emails here.

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24 comments on “Netflix House of Cards: politics without redemption”

One has to ask the question: When automation takes over 95% of the work in the world, where will the jobs come from? Technology doesn’t stop. It moves business toward 100% profit and no overhead. Right now, the third world is our machines. The people work for next to nothing. They can’t buy the products they produce. In the US millions shop at Walmart because that’s their level, that’s what they can afford to spend. When the Japanese can afford to buy 10 dollar a pound almonds, we walk past them at $6.00.

Is capitalism about to come full circle and collapse in its own conundrum? Why must we think in terms of jobs when the necessity of such has disappeared? If you’re getting hot water bubbling out of the earth, only a fool would light a fire to heat water for a bath. If it takes one day’s labor per week, per person in the country, to produce everything we need, how much money would would that one day be worth?

“The one candidate who exemplifies it is Bernie Sanders, who, in his lifetime in Congress, has accomplished virtually nothing.” JR

Nothing?… are you sure?
He voted against Geithner becoming Secretary of the Treasury, Geithner is TC.

How about his filabuster against tax relief, job creation and big bank bail-outs….eght and half hours.
How about his work before congress.

He has been valiant in his belief of human rights, civil rights and MLK. Acting and working on that
He has been activist arrested fro his beliefs…has donald.

He has been impressive in his upholding womens rights and violence against women.

He one of the 66 who voted against the Patriot act…357-66 vote for the Patriot act.
He voted against the Brady law.

He opposed Iraq.

His work in Burlington against the developer and over price elite condo, strip malls, not unlike our Donald who has made money shystering people into such deals.

He actually worked as carpenter, not born with spoon in the mouth. Unlike, “I got a small loan of a million bucks from daddy” Trump.

Is he more qualified to be a politician, I would say yes compared to the Trump.
Trump is plastic and photo ops manager, and “I’ve been corrupt so I would know how to deal with corruption”
Trump is rigged game more of the same.

Do you think Trump is a individual, he is far from that…donald is fake fake, and a whole lot of golf. Trump is about throwing gasoline on a mob on fire.

I don’t believe Bernie should be president…I just don’t like you slant, this is below you. Usually you are so fair minded.

I’ll go with Jon’s take on Bernie. You, apparently, buy into the “rescue from above” concept. As if everything a politician says or does has ANY real positive, constructive meaning whatsoever. As the metaphor from House of Cards reigns in the US, they are all liars, and I say that that’s an understatement. I say they are all psychopaths but let’s go with liars for the moment. Let’s just say they don’t get to a high-level position by telling the truth.

Could Bernie’s “actions” (although it’s hard for me to define the word “action” as sitting on your fat ass for “eight and a half hours”) be nothing more than feigns of actions? Ya know, to make people think he really gives a flying fuck? The vote against the Patriot Act was nothing more than the illusion of checks and balances. Have you ever heard of the term “controlled opposition?” That’s when you get someone who is really on your side to say they are against you in order to give the appearance that all is right and just. Does the Warren Commission ring any bells?

Has Bernie really said anything worth even $1 of monopoly money about the current flagrant violations of human rights by cops against black people? No. Not one single word. Why? Because that subject is anathema to the “news” outlets and Bernie knows he has to tow the line or he’s out of a fat salary. Did I say flagrant? I meant unspeakable violations. Just ridiculously criminal, violent violations. And yet you believe he is a great defender of civil rights.

What he has come out on is gun control. Cuz they want our guns. They need our guns in order to go ahead. So Bernie wants to take back the 2nd Amendment (the one right after the 1st and that’s for a very good reason) because it’s all OK. Everything you hear on the news is the truth, right? We don’t have the sound mental faculties of sane people to own guns and it’s for our own protection so why don’t we give em up? Oh wait, here’s another false flag event with hired crisis actors to make you think there’s another looney just around the corner (there is and he’s wearing a badge). But mommy and daddy (the gov’t) will take care of it. Yeah, right.

Try to view the election this way: who would you like to see as president of the United States of America in 2016? The Joker, The Penguin, or The Riddler? That’s what is really comes down to. What we actually have is a race of Trojan Horses. And all roads lead to Gotham City.

You come late to the argument…and your making illogical fucking assumptions about me.
Personally in your criticisms of politics you spouting words that I wrote.

The only good politician, is one laying tits up on the floor with little crosses on its eyes. And a stake through through his heart.
You are preaching to the choir…bleak baby. I’m on your side.

I am playing mental math with the old man, he is dear to me, and he does’nt get much intellectual sword play with the usual riff raff that frequents this place. He is swashbuckler and an artist of the highest order ya see, his gig is logic and the imagination school. I jab at his logic every so often, keeps him honest.
His bit on bernie was based on conjecture, it is so easy as an artist to fall into the position of being a propagandist for the group.
He has been spouting a little too much in favour of El Donald. A despot, and a stupid one at that…

As a matter of fact we really are all propagandists (artists), the only difference is the the real artist is a propagandist of one…he is spouting off about the in inconsistances, blowing his own horn, presenting the flaws in reality, the shape and nature of the great machine; his propaganda is about his individualism as opposed to a group think, or a consensus.
His propaganda empowers those it reaches, rather than dis-empowers. It shows the hidden, the beauty taken for granted, and above all the cosmic joke of it all.

Bernie…I could’nt care less if the ground opened up and swallowed him…same with that racist dictator Trump, and the hive Queen.
You Batman theme, ok…I think it more of Harry Larry and Moe scenario. The only thing it can be, is hilarious, it’s the cosmic joke part of it….hm.

Michael, you are a hopeless hippy You will never understand common sense,. This is why I gave up on you a few months ago.

Bernie, who is a socialist/communist, will bankrupt the country within the first days in office. He will destroy what is left of the Middle Class.

Socialism and communism lead to tyranny where everyone is a miserable poor slave, with no freedom or individual power whatsoever. .

Capitalism, on the other side (not crony capitalism, but real capitalism) is the best system on Earth. You can imagine, create anything. You get freedom and prosperity.

But, why do I waste my time trying to educate an incurable stubborn hippy?

By the way, hippies. like you, hate successfull people. They cannot stand them. They are jealous and they envy these people who remind them that they haven’t accomplished anything worthwhile in their entire lives.

You don’t have a clue what your talking about, you know nothing of me.
You know nothing of my character, or even how old I am…am I male?…female? Where do I live? How do I make my money? What color am I? Am I really an artist?..what kind?
What country am I living in? What do I own? How much am I worth….hm. Do you know these things?
You know what I tell you…
You have no idea how much money I have…really you don’t. You live in an apartment..lol. I own apartments. Too funny.

So don’t talk to me about hating wealth or being a hippie, or not understanding capitalism.

I throw away more original ideas in five minutes, than you will ever have in your life. I have built great things. Things you will never see.

I know exactly who you are though….So shut up.
You go around sticking labels on things, this is this and so that means that…hippies are this and young people are that. And socialists are this, communism means that… And I know character, I have never been wrong, but I also hate men, but, I like psychopaths.

You are bitter and old, trying to relive a past life, decades old. That world will never come back, and it should’nt. And you have some fantasy, about you and the Trump. Some soap opera playing in your head, lol. Some reality in your head that keeps you warm at night.

I tire of your personal insults, I am tire of your endless propaganda for a loud mouth racist billionaire who wants to become a dictator. Of a radio host who is a loud mouth.

You think I care about any of them. Any at all…Bernie? Hillary? Ted?

My comments here are not directed at you, unless I speak to you directly Quebec in a comment. Which I have stopped doing…it has panned out for me, as an exercise in futility to speak to you.

When I comment, I speak to Jon Rappoport, this is his site. I question what he writes, that is a freedom.
I own all his products, so therefor I have a right to question.

You keep saying you give up on what I say…problem is you won’t shout up though!
So this time please shout up. Mind your own business, I am not speaking to you when I comment…ok!
No more insults. If my speaking about politicians insults you, too bad, I not speaking to you directly, I am voicing a free opinion about them.

Just keep watching your soap operas in the afternoon, and believing your right, and listen to your dictators pour poison into your ears.

But for me, go away! Don’t insult me anymore. I am not interested in what you have to say.

Oh boy! I really did hit straight into the Bullseye. But I already knew that.

One more advice for you: Stop reading and believing the MSM trash on Donald Trump. They are the most dishonest people in the world. And by the way, Trump is not a politician, he’s a business man, in case you didn’t notice.

@FQ
What an obnoxious old hag you are…fuck off.
You did’nt hit any bulleye…I have nothing invested you stupid cow.
I should have used lesser language, I know you don’t understand the english language, you are rude, and a fanatic.
Stop bothering me.
I not interested in you vitriol. Go away.
Go talk to your brother about Trump…your brother the murderer, talk to him.

@bleak
Is that your real name, or your atittude sunshine?
Actually no I am not a slum lord, but I do subsidize a couple of residents, don’t want to toot my own horn. But they are having rough times, it’ll straightened out for them.
As for you..well your just…blea, right.

What’s it to ya? Your reply says a lot about you. Sunshine? Really? I haven’t seen much lately, have you? I may be bleak but I’m also a realist. I don’t bullshit anyone which, apparently, you have a knack for. Good luck with your bad self. Oh wait, there’s no such thing as luck. I guess you’re fucked then, lol.

Centre for Research on Globalization
The Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG) is an independent research and media organization based in Montreal. The CRG is a registered non-profit organization in the province of Quebec, Canada.

“The subliminal message coming out of Bernie is: “All business is bad. All capitalism is bad. All free enterprise is bad and unfair. Adults are unfair to children. The problem can be solved by government.” Rescue from above.

How that works is a mystery, because it doesn’t work. It never has”.

“Imagination is everything that doesn’t already exist.

Imagination demolishes all versions of waiting around for rescue from above. Imagination is the fire. The great adventure.

Imagination is you inventing what was previously unknown.

Imagination is independence.

Every person has imagination and, therefore, the potential for independence.

If “politics” has anywhere to go, that’s where.

That’s where the lying and the manipulation and the crimes can stop.

With the individual.”

Many more reasons why I Love you, Jon Rappoport. Those who are still stuck in the matrix will have all sorts of labels reading this, because how dare you take away hope?!

Those who hold on to hope are prone to experience the flip side, hopelessness. I have removed “hope” from my vocabulary, along with “should”, for quite some time now. Thank you for being you, and for all you contribute, especially for your encouragement to preside over our own lives, and our own, sovereign being❤

“Those who are still stuck in the matrix will have all sorts of labels reading this, because how dare you take away hope?” (elxroflife:)

You see, what Jon really teaches is this:

Power Outside The Matrix is all about being able to think, act, and create both outside and inside The Matrix. Because that’s the goal: to be able to function in both places.

So, Trump, as an individual, wants to make America great again. He believes he can do it. We hope he can do it. if we side with him and help him to do it. with our imagination and our own creativity, we will succeed. I see nothing wrong with that, on the contrary.

If America becomes great again (meaning that most of the corruption is gone), can you imagine what individuals could do? It would be incredible!

We each use our own intuition and imagination, and give our own interpretation to Jon’s writing. I see it more like: stop giving your power away. Get involved, do your part. Your government is a very estranged, fascist predator. He can see how Trump is upsetting the political status quo, and also takes response-ability for his projections on the Trump he would like to see, and knowing the actual Trump most likely would fall short. I agree with you that individuals can make ALL the difference on terms of using our creative gifts and talents. This of course includes our imagination. We need massive activism on things we are passionate about, as those are usually the things that matter. I am doing my part. And yes, I can imagine what we can do when each of us is willing to clear ourselves from corrupted thought forms and actions, and instead be who we are and do what is appropriate for our evolution. At the same time I leave room for things to fall into place even better then I can imagine. I do anticipate things (the unsustainable stuctures of society) have to fall apart first. Yes, it will be incredible, beyond what we can imagine.

Instead of hope, I go straight to trusting in the power we can yield together, co-creating a new paradigm, with sustainable structures, generated from the inside by each individual.

Same actor, same character, different name, different movie? “The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was to convince the world he didn’t exist”
Ending – The Usual Suspects *spoilers* Best scene ever – YouTube

“Right now, hold your head up high America, stick your chest out, because for this moment, the good guys are finally winning. And even if the election is stolen or they kill Trump, his ideas cannot be killed. Trump has already won and we have already won”.

Anyway, as intriguing as HoC’s is, it’s still gets filed under Mind Control, right? True, the psychopaths portrayed in it are analogous to their real life counterparts (give or take a few individual and mass murders here and there) but isn’t HoC’s just another gauge to filter the populace with? To predict their actions/reactions?

Looking at the HoC’s Facebook page over the years, I couldn’t help but notice how many people actually root for Frank, Claire and their minions. I got into a dialog with one kid who said he wanted to be like Frank, run for office, and commit heinous, psychopathic acts against his fellow man. I told him that posting his intent of criminality, albeit a little premature, might come back to bite him on the ass someday if he were successful. I guess that made some sense to him because he deleted all his comments lol. Woops, too late lol.

As bad as the HoC’s characters are, do they even come close to the real thing? I’m thinking mostly of the CIA here. No mention of any agency who operates in secret with agendas/operations that baffle the mind in their cunning, conniving heinousness (MK Ultra for example).

But I got this lurking notion that the shadow gov’t has a thing for hiding the truth in plain sight. For some reason, they think that by telling people some parts of what is actually taking place because of events they set in motion, they somehow absolve themselves from Divine Retribution (Karma). Yeah. It is tied to the occult definitely and there may be some reference in the Talmud which I am currently searching for.